MIDWIFERY

At UHL we have many opportunities for Midwives (including internationally educated midwives) and Maternity Care Assistants in our busy and exciting maternity units, with great opportunities for career progression in our teams.

We are a forward thinking team with a philosophy of providing the best possible care to women, babies, and their families. This is achieved by providing effective training, education and working collaboratively as a midwifery and medical team.

Opportunities in Maternity Services

Our maternity services are based across two obstetric consultant led units with one being a tertiary neonatal unit at the Leicester Royal Infirmary and one at the Leicester General Hospital, East Leicester. In addition, we provide community midwifery services and have a stand-alone birth centre, specialist antenatal clinics and services, antenatal and postnatal wards, maternity assessment units, delivery suites and birth centres at both sites and a home birth team.

At UHL we have many opportunities for Midwives (including Internationally educated midwives) and Maternity Care Assistants in our busy and exciting maternity units.

If you would like to discuss joining the Maternity team, contact [email protected]

For hospital queries contact:
Lorna Phillips-Gray
Recruitment, Retention & Pastoral Matron
[email protected]

For Community queries contact:
Emily Wakelin
Community Midwifery Matron
[email protected]

Midwifery

We welcome midwives at all stages of their career at UHL and have excellent support packages with preceptorship development and clinical leadership opportunities in place to help you thrive in your career.

Maternity Services at UHL is based across two hospitals which collectively accommodate just under 10,000 births per year. As a tertiary unit, we cover a large geographical area with a diverse population, so working at UHL is exciting, fast-paced and full of opportunity to learn.

For newly qualified midwives, we have a year-long preceptorship programme where you will be supported both clinically and pastorally to develop the confidence and skills you’ll need to progress to a band 6. You will have a 6 week supernumerary period incorporating training days to support your development (in skills such as suturing and IV drug administration for example) and our passionate and dedicated recruitment, retention and pastoral care midwives will be present throughout your journey to also provide hands-on clinical support. You will spend your first year mainly working on delivery suite, in the birth centre and on the wards to build the foundations you need as a safe and competent practitioner.

For experienced midwives we offer an enhanced maternity care and simulation day, adult cannulation, midwife-in-charge training and a variety of midwifery related study days. We also help staff to grow and progress with development packages for each grade, including a range of leadership courses.

We are also welcoming midwives from outside the UK and have a dedicated midwife for international recruitment. Their role is to support our international midwives from the start of their OSCE programme and throughout their initial 12 week transition period before they commence their bespoke preceptorship programme.

Midwifery led units

St Mary’s Birth Centre is a free-standing Midwife-led unit situated in the east of Leicestershire in Melton Mowbray. The team is fully integrated, staffing the birth centre 24 hours a day and providing care to a community caseload of approximately 900 bookings. The Birth Centre has approximately 150 births per annum, over 50% being water births and offers aromatherapy and NIPE. St Mary’s Birth Centre has an 8-bedded postnatal ward and approximately 400 women transfer to the centre postnatally each year for locally renowned feeding support. Partner overnight stay is available and the team are proud to boast a continuity rate of 90%.

We have a number of specialist midwifery posts ensuring the women and families within our maternity services receive the best possible care. Our specialist roles cover diabetes, hypertension, safeguarding, teenage pregnancy, blood borne infections, asylum seekers and homelessness, bereavement, alcohol and substance misuse and perinatal mental health.

We also have an award-winning research team carrying out some of the latest research that in the future could change and enhance maternity care for all. There are a number of research studies and further details can be found on our website.

Maternity Support Workers

We also have maternity care assistants, maternity support workers and nursery nurses working within our maternity services. They help to care for mothers, babies and their families whilst working under the supervision of a registered midwife. Jobs are available within delivery suites, maternity theatres and post-natal wards at Leicester Royal Infirmary and Leicester General Hospital, at St Mary’s birth centre in Melton Mowbray and out in the community.

Career development

We have great opportunities for support worker development whether it is starting out as an apprentice to becoming a Band 2 Maternity Care Assistant. You will get the training you need to do the job and during your induction you will also be supported to complete the Care Certificate if you haven’t already done so. With experience you could become a Maternity Support Worker (at Band 3) or you could apply to train as nursing associate.

Through the apprenticeship levy we can offer you the chance to study for Senior Healthcare Support Worker at Level 3. On successful completion you will gain an apprenticeship standard and Level 3 Diploma in Healthcare Support qualification. We can also support you to gain maths and/or English Level 2 via a local college if you don’t already have these qualifications.

Working Life

We are actively seeking midwives who want to return to practice. Please contact us to discuss working patterns that may be available to support your work/life balance.

Professional Midwifery Advocates (PMA)

Midwifery at UHL has had long and effective support from Supervisors of Midwives and more recently from PMA’s.

The ultimate aim of professional midwifery advocacy using the A-EQUIP model is that through staff empowerment and development, action to improve quality of care becomes an intrinsic part of everyone’s role in every part of the maternity system. UHL currently has 15 PMA’s who can provide persistent, high-quality support and guidance to our midwives and other staff working within maternity.

Colleague Stories: Rachel Darling’s Maternity Journey

“I have already learned so much since joining the team, but this training is an extra string to my bow.”

Discover my Maternity journey

Preceptorship

We have three Recruitment, Retention and Pastoral Midwives working in our maternity units and in community teams to provide clinical support to newly qualified midwives.

Preceptorship is a period to guide and support all newly qualified practitioners in the transition from student to autonomous practitioner. There is lots of work going on to develop a national preceptorship standard for midwifery and once this is published we will align our programme to these standards. We also work closely with the UHL School of Nursing and Midwifery and with the local universities to make sure we are supporting our new midwives in the best way that we can.

For more information on our preceptorship programme please see the dedicated preceptorship page within the School of Nursing and Midwifery Practice page.

We are also developing a new preceptor training programme for our midwives andnNurses at UHL to help them develop their skills to support our new registrants.

Developing your career at UHL

There are lots of opportunities for career development whilst working as a midwife at UHL.

You may want to become a ward manager or a delivery suite co-ordinator. We have clinical leadership training packages which will give you the necessary knowledge and skills to undertake your role.

You may want to consider the Specialist Midwifery Pathway, for example Specialist Midwife for Hypertension or Bereavement or Diabetes. There are other new and innovative roles being developed for example Digital or Clinical Audit Midwife.

We have a dedicated team of research midwives and research support officers working closely with Leicester’s Research and Innovation team and the NIHR Clinical Research Network for the East Midlands, who fund the research midwife posts at Leicester’s Hospitals. Current trials include Genetic studies, Prematurity Prevention studies and Obstetric Haematology studies.

Feedback

The preceptorship programme receives excellent feedback and has been presented nationally to highlight the excellent preceptorship package that we offer. We regularly receive feedback that tells us our preceptorship programme is well structured, very thorough and detailed, supports development of competencies, and makes the transition to a NQM easier – all achieved in a good, supportive environment.

Colleague Stories

best career change I ever made

“After almost 30 years in another career and in my late 40s, it was time for a change. 5 years on and with a Level 2 apprenticeship at LRI, lots of hard work, training, and working in various maternity support roles, I am now working as a Band 3 MSW in the community. It is never too late to chase your dream job and I have found mine. Working alongside midwives supporting antenatal and postnatal women and their families is a rewarding career to be part of.”

Rachel Darling, Maternity Support Worker, Mallory Midwifery Team

UHL offers great career development opportunities

“I cannot say thank you enough for all the support, teaching, mentoring and leadership I have experienced throughout the years working at University Hospitals of Leicester. I have met fantastic teachers, inspirational leaders, caring and passionate people. I’ve learned what teamwork is.”

Magda Kierzenkowska, Midwife / Research Development Midwife